The Timaru Herald. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1894.

Timaru Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 6066, 27 September 1894, Page 2

The Timaru Herald. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1894.

The two meetings of bank shareholders — the Bank of New Zealand at Wellington, and the Colonial Bank at Dun-edin-^tobk place yesterday according to appointment, and the scheme of amalgamation may now be pronounced to be as dead aa Julius Cffl3ar. At the Wellington meeting, Mr Mnrray, who occupied the chair, seems to have dismissed the subject m a very few words. The object m view, he said, had been to add largely te the business of the bank, and therefore to its profits. He credited the Government with having been m earnest at first, and thought that some circumstances must have made them change their minds afterwards. He did not mention what those circumstances were, or suggest what they might have been. We think that he was m error about the change of front. As we pointed out yesterday, there was nothing to lead to the conclusion that the Government were not m earnest from first to last. It matters not from whom the original suggestion for amalgamation came. Let as suppose that the Government said—" formulate yonr scheme and we will consider it." The representatives of the two banks did formulate their scheme, it was considered by the Cabinet, and a reply given as soon as possible. Was it to be expected that those to whom the proposals were made should swallow them as a whole, if there were parts which were distßßteful ? With Mr Murray's few remarks the subject of amalgamation appears to have dropped, and the meeting passed on to the guarantee business and the election of new directors, matters with which we are not at present concerned. At the half-yearly meeting of the Colonial Bank> the Hon. George McLean had a good deal to say about the amalgamation scheme, and two reports of his speech (both supplied by the Press Association) are published m another column. A good deal of what appears m one will not be found m the other. He assumed that the Government modifications were absolutely inadmissible, and the few shareholders who spoke adopted the same view. No resolution on the matter was submitted. It was simply dropped, and the meeting passed on to the consideration of the ordinary business, the report and balance sheet being adopted, apparently without any dissent.